Wednesday, January 06, 2016

February 7-10, 2016 Potential for Midwest Snow and Brutal Cold

Certain alignments between the Sun and Mars have been observed by astro-meteorologists to be disruptive to the weather engendering storms with whipping gusty winds. Such an alignment occurs on February 7, 2016. To better understand the weather that we may expect, let's take a look at the weather patterns that developed during one of the last Sun-Mars alignments that happened on January 2, 2014.

In order to localize the influence of that Sun-Mars alignment, we'll look at the geographical areas the Sun and Mars affected by referring to two key charts. The chart for the winter 2013-14 season placed Mars over the New England area of the United States. The Accuweather headline on the 2nd read "Blizzard to Reach From NYC to Boston Thursday Night." Needless to say, road conditions suffered and flight cancellations resulted.

In another key chart, Mars was placed along the 94th line of west longitude running through Minnesota, Iowa, and southward. On January 3rd, the Weather Channel warned that blizzard conditions were imminent for parts of the Dakotas and northwest Minnesota. As the storm developed it would affect Wisconsin, Michigan, Missouri, and Ohio followed by an invasion of brutally cold air over the northern Plains and the Midwest.

February 7-10, 2016

A similar pattern is established by the next Sun-Mars alignment on February 7th of this year with some slight differences. Following is a map for one of the key charts.

The geographical area that Mars will affect is shown by the blue line running from north to south from Minnesota down through Louisiana. The white line running along the East Coast is the area the Sun's influence will affect. These are by and large the same areas that were affected in January 2014. We will likely see a strong winter storm system gear up over the central U.S. and affect the northern tier states and Midwest between February 7-10. The storm during this period could push eastward and affect the Mid-Atlantic coast on up through the Northeast and New England with a weather pattern similar to that of January 2014.

The map for the 2015-16 winter season also affects the western states as shown below.

Here we see the Sun and Mars exerting an influence along the west coast and through the Intermoutain West or Great Basin. We may expect a round of winter storms to punch their way into the West Coast during the period between the 7th and 10th of February.